


Bargaining

by DisasterLesbean



Category: The Haunting of Hill House (TV 2018), The Haunting of Hill House - Shirley Jackson
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-25
Updated: 2018-11-25
Packaged: 2019-08-07 05:06:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16401869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DisasterLesbean/pseuds/DisasterLesbean
Summary: She doesn't know what's true, what's real. She isn't sure if she wants to know.





	1. Cake

The sun is barely setting by the time Theo pulls into her driveway. She's back at the house a little earlier than usual since her last session was cut short and intended to shower before dinner. She sets her bags down in their designated spot near the door before sidetracking to the baking she smells. The cake Trish made is set out cooling and Theo spots what she’s looking for in the sink. Trish hadn’t rinsed the bowl clean yet and she gleefully swipes a finger through the batter.

“Theodora Crain.” Comes a reprimand from behind her. She’s been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Well, close enough. She should’ve have known. The other woman could sleep through a train wreck but her Theo senses are frightening.

“Hey babe.” Theo smiles winningly at her as she turns around. The offending finger still covered in cake batter.

She has an indulgent smile and Theo takes that as a good sign. “That shit will kill you.” 

“I’m pretty sure if I survived Luke’s singing I can take some Salmonella.” 

“Oh really doctor?”

“Definitely.” 

Trish’s laugh fills the quiet kitchen. Unless they are talking it is always very quiet around the house. When Trish isn’t at the house, Theo listens to music to fill the silence. Since moving in together she’s had to do that less. 

Trish’s fingers wrap around her wrist bringing her finger passed her lips and into her mouth. Theo can feel her humor, her arousal, her joy. It mixes with her own and sets off on their own dance. Trish playfully sucks the batter off her finger nearly causing her knees to buckle at the sensation on her hypersensitive skin. “Trish.” Theo gasps only making her mischievous grin grow further. She scrapes her teeth across her finger and that was all Theo could take. She brings her hand to Trish’s lower back and tugs her in for a kiss. She licks the batter off the other woman’s lip causing her to open her mouth. Trish tastes like the batter she’d stolen and homemade icing.

Theo feels Trish's hand creeping up under her shirt and smiles into their kiss. Trish takes the opportunity to bring her tongue into her mouth gliding over her own. Theo starts to walk Trish back to the counter and when she reaches it she lifts her onto it. Theo breaks the kiss and trails her lips across the woman’s jaw until she reached her ear. “Take your shirt off.” She husks into her ear.  
Trish whips her shirt off before throwing it behind her somewhere in the living room. Theo runs her hands up Trish's hips and over her ribs before dragging them back down marking a light pink path in its wake. The pleasure from Trish spikes harder and causing Theo to slip and make one of the biggest mistakes of her life. Her elbow sinks into the cake that was cooling closer to them then she realized. “Oh fuck.”

Trish’s eyes narrow and she leans back from her. Her arousal still hangs around but it is distinctly muted by anger. “Theodora Crain.” That is the second time she’d used her full name. She is on a roll today. She’d end up back with Shirley if she didn’t start grovelling.

“Babe-” 

“Don’t even try it.”

“You’re just too beautiful. It distracted me.”

“I said don’t try. You won’t flatter your way out of this one.” A sigh. “That was Luke’s sober cake.” That is the real issue. Trish wouldn’t have minded so much had it just been a cake for them she’d messed up. Instead, Theo messed up the cake for Luke’s second anniversary of sobriety. The longest he’s made it since he first started. 

Theo rests her forehead against Trish’s and exhales shakily, still coming down from the high she’d been in and processing the new clash of emotions. She knows she needs to apologize but she hates it. Apologizing isn’t natural to her and it was always something she had to work up to. Something to pull out of herself and give to someone else. “I’m sorry.” She is. It’s her brother but Trish has grown close to Luke. More than that, Trish is an unbelievably caring person. She wanted to make something nice for Luke, it was as simple as that.

Trish kisses the corner of her mouth. “I know, it’s fine. You didn’t mean to. We shouldn’t have gotten carried away in here.”

“We can stop by the bakery on the way over?”

“We’re going to have to. You’re gonna have to shower first. You are covered in chocolate.”

“I’d planned to. Wanna join me?” She wiggles her eyebrows for effect only to receive another conciliatory kiss from her wife.

“We’ll be late then.” 

“We would have been late if we’d finished what was going on earlier.” 

“We wouldn’t have had to stop by the bakery and would have made it on time. Go shower.” Trish laughs pushing her away and towards their room.

“Oh sure suck on my finger and have the audacity to act blameless in it all.” Theo grumbles on her way to the shower. True to her word and much to Theo’s disappointment, Trish didn’t join her. She showers quickly very aware she might be single if she made them anymore late. 

When she comes back out the bowl is no longer in the sink and the now wrecked cake sat wrapped. “We’ll still eat it.” Trish answers her unspoken question. Her shirt was back on and keys in hand. 

“You’re driving?” 

“You put your elbow through my cake. So yeah, I’m driving.” She couldn’t refute that. They walk to Trish’s car and she obediently gets in the passenger seat. She looks longingly at her jeep. “Don’t pout.” She points her finger at at Theo who tried her best to look innocent. “Which bakery?”

“The one we got cookies from last week, it’s on the way.”

When Trish has her bad days Theo has tried to find ways to make them easier. Trish would try suffering in silence which would infuriate Theo. The beginning of their relationship was rocky because of the way both of them dealt with issues. They ended up in fights more often than not in the beginning. Theo would call Trish out on hiding her feelings and Trish would get pissed at her because she did the same. 

Trish’s family hated when she’d try and talk to them about her feelings and she’s made it a habit not to share. She admitted to Theo she also didn’t like talking about her issues because she felt like hers were minor compared to everything Theo had gone through. Theo had to swallow her curses at Trish’s family and assured her their grief wasn’t in competition. The two damaged people had to learn how to fit their jagged edges together. 

Now Trish was more open about when she’d go through her episodes or wasn’t having a good day. Theo found baked goods helped make her days less shitty. It couldn’t fix it but it could make it better. She couldn’t bake if her life depended on it so she got acquainted with the local bakeries.

“How was your day?” Theo asks her. She hadn’t picked up any negative emotions earlier but she wants to know about Trish's day from her rather than a moment of contact.

“Class was a bitch. I don’t know why I thought a PhD in sociology was a good idea.” 

“Because you love it and want to teach it.”

“That’s true I suppose. That one student tried acting smarter than the professor again.” 

“How’d that go?”

“Professor humiliated him.” 

“Good.” Trish’s laugh brought a smile to her face. It was her favorite sound in the world.

“We’re here. We’ve got to hurry or we’re going to go from fashionably late to asshole late.” Theo could hear the warning in her wife’s voice and unclicks her seatbelt.

“Got it. Get the cake and go.”

The bakery was blessedly not busy. The same older man from the week before is working the counter. She walks over to him to pay while Trish picks a cake. 

She should have known, nothing is ever easy. “Theo…” Trish’s voice is hesitant. Softer then it has been since Theo put her arm through the cake. 

“What’s up babe?”

“Is this your only cake?” She asks the cashier.

“For right now, yes. If you want to wait there will be more.” The old man tells her.

“We can wait.”

“You don’t wanna be asshole late, Trish. What’s wrong with it?” Theo asks walking around the display case towards her wife. Trish wraps her arm around her waist as she did whenever she needed to ground Theo. She could see why Trish is worried.

It sat there innocently, as all cakes should be. It shouldn’t be dangerous. It shouldn’t speed Theo’s heart rate and slow her breathing. Yet. All she can see is the red. 

The others didn’t particularly like red after all that had happened but Theo couldn’t stand it. The first time she saw Trish in red she nearly had a panic attack. It took her hours to tell the other woman she has an irrational fear of red. That she hated it. The others didn’t know the extent to her aversion of red, they thought she simply disliked it like they did. Trish understands exactly what it is to her.

Red is her mom’s death. Red is Nell’s death. Red is her dad’s death. Red is the monsters and horrors that haunted them all. It is the blood that foamed out of an overdosed Luke. It is the very evil of that house.

“Breathe. Just breathe.” She can hear Trish’s muffled reassurances. She can feel Trish's arm draw her in even tighter. Her bare hand had snuck under Theo's shirt and was rubbing calming circles on her hip. She can feel Trish's worry, love, comfort. It doen’t complement Theo’s fear and panic well. 

She is doing immersion therapy once a week to try and de-trigger the color red, take the stress and anxiety out of it. It is a slow going process. Sometimes she could handle red and have no reaction. Other times, it was like this. 

She takes a deep choppy breath. “We’ll take it.” She tells the cashier who goes to collect it.

“We don’t have to.” Her wife tries to calm her.

“I need to get over it, it’s just a cake.”

She keeps repeating that mantra in her head. It’s just a cake. It doesn’t work. It doesn’t make it easier. When she passes over her debit card she does so mechanically. When they go back into the car she can’t bring herself to say anything to Trish. She sits and focused on her breathing. She can feel the cake’s presence. The red’s presence. It is a maw waiting to consume her. Trying to suck her in and absorb her. 

It isn’t a far drive to get there but she feels every moment. Each second is an infinity. The reality of the red seeping into her mind.

“Theo.” Trish’s voice is tight, so very worried. “You gotta talk to me here.”

“I’m okay.”

“Bullshit. Use your words doctor.”

“I’ll be okay. Just need to get there and away from it.”

By the time they get there everyone else is already there. Trish grabs the cake and brings it away from her. The door opens to Steve with a beer and crooked smile. “You guys made it, Shirley was ready to send out a search team.”

“Of course she was.” If her voice is thinner than usual Steve doesn’t mention it. 

“Trish driving?”

“Someone couldn’t be trusted behind the wheel.” Trish hip-checks her on her way passed Steve, finally the cake is out of her view.

“Sounds like there’s a story there.” Steve hands her a beer.

“Nothing you need to know about.”

The night went well after that. She caught up with her siblings and watches Trish’s easy manner with them. Leigh has gone from pregnant to very pregnant since the last time she’d seen her. She talked to her for quite a while, curious to see if Steve and Leigh had overcome their issues instead of trying to patch them with a kid. She seemes genuinely happy with Steve, what was broken between them appears to be mended. The same could be said for Shirley and Kevin. They were better now then they had ever been.

Luke is glowing. He is working and he is sober. He’d moved in with Steve for a while until he was able to sustain himself. He is happy about the cake and indulgent in everyone else's celebration. He is proud. It looks good on him. 

She abandons her conversation with Leigh when she starts talking about how good of a mother Theo would make. She goes over to Trish and wraps her arms around her. Theo kisses her cheek and lures her away from the conversation she is having with Luke. They sit together on the couch alone for a few minutes before Kevin joins them. 

When it comes time for cake, Trish shoots her a worried look. Theo squeezes her hand in return. She’s calmed down and can stand there and celebrate her brother’s achievement without breaking down. She can’t help the roll of her eyes at the red candle because of course there would be a red candle. She can’t bring herself to eat it but no one questions her on it.

They stay around a little longer but eventually leave to go back to the house. Theo changes when they get back to the house and collapses into their bed ready to fall asleep. Trish has different plans when she walks in with their wrecked cake cut into what resembled two slices. 

“I said we weren’t wasting it.”


	2. Street Light

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all your comments!   
> So apparently they're married and not dating by the "epilogue" scene? This is chronologically before the first chapter. Went back and changed references from girlfriend to wife.

She has a plan. She has an extravagant plan to show Trish how important she is to her. Private enough to where she wouldn’t be on display but public enough to be romantic. It is elaborate. It is going to be the best goddamn proposal in the family. Better than Steve’s or Kevin’s. Second best, perhaps. No one can take that honor from Arthur. She doesn’t even want to try. The happiness on Nell’s face was ethereal. It was something that flooded the room and infected them all with joy. It was impossible not to feel happy that day. 

In short, her proposal is going to be amazing. 

Then Trish ruined it.

Trish and Theo take walks once a week. Sometimes it will be a more intense hike, sometimes just a stroll around the neighborhood. It depends on how much energy they want to expend and what their schedules look like. Trish’s favorite spot they’d found in their walks or hikes is in the mountains. It’s not too strenuous of a walk but it takes more effort than a walk around the neighborhood. The forest is plentiful along the path, lined with vegetation. The air is fresh and crisp which is a nice change from the city. Trish fell in love with it the first time they walked it. She fully intended to go there next week, after a huge paper of Trish’s was done, and to propose there.

That doesn’t happen.

They are sitting at a nearby park, only a few minutes away from their house, swinging idly. It is their weekly walk and Trish has led them here. It is incidentally Theo’s favorite destination. She enjoys the simplicity. The rare metal slide that hadn’t been replaced, the woodchips beneath her feet, the pair of swings, and a quaint play structure. It is a childhood she never had. She doesn’t remember much before the house, it’s like their lives started there. After with her aunt, they didn’t go to parks. 

There was too much to do, too much to handle to waste time at parks. They’d eventually start moving on from the house and their dead mom but they still never played at playgrounds. Got drunk in parking lots, sure, but they never could play in parks. It seemed ingenuine. 

“You think celebrities count as idol worship?” Trish speaks, breath misting in the air. It was silent before she spoke, just the wind rustling through the trees. Trish runs her thumb along Theo’s hand. She can’t feel it through their gloves but the gestured carries the weight of familiarity. Trish wears that path along her hand often enough it should be inscribed with her name. It is a comforting gesture, one full of love. 

“Undoubtedly. Trying to integrate that into your paper?” Theo asks her. She holds onto the chains of the swing with her free hand, grazing the woodchips below with her toes. Trish hates whenever Theo goes barefoot in the woodchips, it disgusts her and she makes Theo wash her feet before getting in bed. She hates it even more when it’s as cold as it is, Trish calls her irresponsible for it.

“I’m working a few things together. Idols are worship but not ritual.”

“They’re involved in rituals.” 

“True. Then what qualifies as a ritual?”

“A ceremony with meaning?”

“I’d agree. Marriage for instance would be a human ritual.” The discussion of marriage floods Theo with nerves. She knows she wants to propose to Trish but she is filled with nervous excitement. Butterflies fill her stomach.

“I suppose, it’s a meaningful ceremony with traditions. It even has idols.”

“Marriage is also different according to culture.”

The sheer excitement exuding from Trish makes Theo laugh. “Nerd.”

“Well.” Trish bobs her legs anxiously a few times. “In our culture it is natural to ask for permission to propose.” Theo makes a derisive noise at that. “Which is exactly how I thought you’d react, which is why I didn’t ask Steve.” 

“What?” Trish is out of her seat and kneeling before Theo in record time. Kneeling in the woodchips that disgust her so much, for her. It takes her a moment to look away from where Trish is biting her lip to the obvious engagement ring sitting in a dark blue box.

“Theodora Crain.” Trish’s eyes are watery and she is so soft in this moment it pulls Theo closer. “I can’t begin to explain how in love I’ve fallen.” Theo doesn’t let her continue. She drops to her knees in front of Trish pulling her face towards her before kissing her deeply.

“Then don’t try. Yes, the answer is always yes.” Theo breathes heavy, her heart beating in tune to Trish’s puffs of laughter. 

“I want to. I need to.” She kisses her once more before pulling back. Trish gives a good attempt to organize her face into a more serious expression and fails completely. Her goofy smile stays in place, the edges creasing with smile lines and her eyes are glowing with restrained glee. “When I met you, I couldn’t believe you were real. I suppose that was your intention, to be aloof. Unreachable. Untouchable. You were so real, are so real. You tried to hide it but I could see you behind that armor. I could see the woman I would fall in love with. You’re the strongest woman I know. Everyday with you is better because you’re in my life. I love you completely so please, please, be my wife.” Her voice breaks near the end of her speech, tears trailing down her face. Theo has never been more in love than in this moment. She wipes away Trish’s tears fighting her own. Theo nods fiercely bringing a shaky hand down so Trish can slide the ring on. 

Theo brings her other hand to her thick jacket and brings out a box and Trish looks at it incredulously. “You beat me by a week you ass.” Trish laughs and reaches forward to open it herself. She looks awestruck at the ring, at Theo. She traces Theo’s lips with her thumb, an adoring look on her face. She can feel Trish’s surprise, surprise that Theo would make a step like this in their relationship. She doesn’t know how to tell Trish she would do anything for the woman, that marrying her is Theo’s privilege. “Marry me?” 

“I give you a speech and that’s your proposal?” Trish’s arched eyebrow is filled with judgement but her emotions sing joy. 

“You’re my home.” Trish crushes their lips together at Theo’s confession, her proposal. Hill house was always The House, her aunt’s house was her childhood house, their house is just that, their house. Trish hates she won’t call it her home but she won’t. She never will think of a building as a home, she’s seen the deception they can bring. People are her home, Trish is her home. Trish is a cold nose pressing against her shoulder in the morning, she’s biting comments at her classmates, she’s her best friend and greatest love. She’s family after a lifetime of complicated family. They fight, they don't agree on everything, but she’s not broken like Theo’s family still is.

Theo topples her over, her hand falling to Trish’s hip where her shirt has ridden up. She wishes she could lay her bare hand against Trish’s skin, feel her joy mixing with Theo’s own. She brings her gloved hand up to her mouth, pulling at it with her teeth. Trish covers it with her own hand. “Race home?” She asks breathlessly. 

It’s home to Trish. Where Theo can’t bring herself to call it home, Trish can and will. She grew up with a stable family, never moving from her childhood house until college. Her family has its issues and dysfunction but it isn’t intrinsically broken like Theo’s. She had holidays in the same house, a roof that she felt safe enough to sleep in. She had her parents together. Trish isn’t branded with the memory of her dead mother on the floor of the building that was greedy enough to try to call itself a home. Theo is happy Trish thinks of their house as a home. 

Trish treasures the place as their first house together. She redecorated the entire place, which she demanded Theo give her opinion on. Every time she brings home a new rug or knick-knack the obvious happiness stamps out any bitterness Theo is prone to. 

Theo reluctantly stands, getting off Trish, but is enticed by her expression. It’s full of promise. Trish half-heartedly runs away from Theo towards their house. Trish has to stop briefly to put her shoes back on before chasing back after Trish. She slows down as Theo approaches her. Trish links their hands together tugging her faster. Theo yanks her back towards her, pressing her against a nearby peeling red street light. “Where do you think you’re going Mrs. Crain?” 

“Try Park-Crain.”

“Why try it when I can marry her?” 

“I hate you.” 

“You love me.” 

Trish lets her head fall against Theo’s shoulder. Trish’s warm breath brushing against her throat, fingers grabbing onto Theo’s jacket. Trish’s hair is cold against her lips but she presses against the other woman’s head regardless. The world keeps revolving, the night keeps going, but Theo swears in that moment everything froze around them. It is an endless moment. 

“I really do.”


End file.
